A Virgen a Day: Gratitude and Love

Good Morning -

Yesterday was my birthday, which makes me now officially halfway to 70. I know I probably shouldn't be so forward focused and 70 is a pretty arbitrary forward age, but there's something about 35 and there's something about 70 that just feels so good.

I love my birthday. I get excited anytime I see the number 22, especially if it's paired with the number 8 - which happens at least twice a day if I'm around a clock at just the right moment. It feels like such a good, round number. It feels symbolic. It feels whole. I love it.

Maybe it's because I'm the third oldest of seven kids who were born within an eight-year time span. Maybe it's because, growing up in my family, your birthday was the one day that individualized you - celebrated you all unto yourself. Maybe it's because I'm a Leo. Maybe it's a past-life thing. Maybe it's a number of factors that I don't really care about - what matters is that I love my birthday.

But as much as I love them, they haven't always been good. Seven years ago on my 28th birthday, I had a particularly wretched birthday. I was in San Antonio and newly moved into my apartment while the violent man who was renting with the supposed intent to buy was living in the home I owned with my friend/more-than-friend/friend/more-than-friend/friend/less-than-friend, who had earlier in the summer taken off for Ecuador so she could learn to teach English in foreign countries - thus precipitating the need to sell the home (I had no sale leads all summer and I couldn't pay the mortgage by myself, so my crappy realtor at the time found this jerk who would live there and pay the mortgage while he worked on qualifying for his own mortgage. Bad idea. Lessons learned.)

Less-than-friend was back by then, certificate to teach English abroad in her hand, but loafing and loitering around my new apartment because she just didn't know what she was going to do with herself.

She was eating the little food I had, running my window units (and, thereby, electric bill) way higher than needed, hogging my computer, not doing anything toward helping sell the house we owned together that the violent man (whom I would eventually have to evict and call the police on and who, in retribution, wrote on the walls of the house in crayon that I was a bitch and, I think if I remember right, a lesbian) was inhabiting, and not contributing to either the work or the finances of the house.

I was teaching high school at the time, which meant that school was back in by my birthday. I spent the day at school, teaching my ED, LD, BAD kids and came home to her sitting depressed in front of my computer. She had used some crayons to draw me a "happy birthday" note, but it was half-hearted and lame.

Taking matters into my own hands, I suggested we get some dinner. She claimed to have no money for that and I was waiting for my end-of-the month paycheck, so didn't have enough for both. I scrounged in my kitchen, and everything I suggested she said she didn't want. I don't remember what I finally came up with, but I know that I attempted to make a pan of jell-o so I could rest votive candles on it, sing, blow them out and make a wish.

The jell-o never set, the candles got all messed up, and I took myself to bed to have a good, good cry. There was a lot going on at the time and I was miserable and more than a little pathetic.

I did, though, that night vow that I would never leave my birthday up to someone else. I solidified that night that, in order to celebrate my birthday, I need three things - something to unwrap (can be homemade - it's the unwrapping, surprize element), something to blow out on a desert (I like the singing and the opportunity to focus and make a wish for the next 365 days), and people that are as excited about my birthday as I am.

The birthdays following that most dreadful one in 2001 were self-directed and wonderful. Sometimes I was alone, but always I took the time to honor and celebrate myself, feel the love from those who sent wishes and love through cards and emails, and set a course for the next year.

For the last two years, I've been with my wonderful partner for my birthday, so the lessons have shifted. Instead of learning to take care of myself, honor and love myself, and create what I know I need, I've had opportunity to practice receiving wave after wave of love and not stop the flow with "oh, you shouldn't have's", or "I owe this person and am going to have to give back just as much as I've received", or "really, it's too much" (too much what? Love? Honey, there is no such thing.).

This year was no exception. She bathed me in love the whole day (despite getting some really hard news for herself), and I was awash in love from friends around the country. I took the day off of work, relaxed, met my partner and a friend for lunch at Poca Cosa, came back for a massage, and then headed out for dinner, drinks and Suzanne Westenhoefer's comedy show at the Rialto. We both laughed so hard and it was so much what we needed.

My partner got some hard, hard news yesterday that something she's been working on wasn't going to happen. She's invested so much time, energy, thought, and heart into the process, that it was hard. She could have, justifiably, said, "Honey - I can't tonight. I'm done. I just need to curl up and cry for the evening."

What happened instead was that she talked and cried while I listened, then I talked and cried while she listened, then we both decided to set it aside for the night and go celebrate all that is good in our lives - each other topping both lists. It was a beautiful evening and the laughter carried us through to a better place, a place of renewed hope and determination to keep working on the goal until it does happen.

Today's activity is to reply with my heartfelt thanks to all the messages of celebration and love that I received yesterday. I admit, my work continues to be in sitting still in all that love without squirming and thinking that I've had enough. Again, Honey, there is enough love to go around, so I can accept that which comes to me with joy and without thinking that it means I now "owe" the person.

So - that's our Virgen. Chocolate cake foundation for the flourless chocolate cake we shared at dinner, a postcard from the comedy show, and the "happy birthday" note from the bottom of our Poca Cosa bill.

This is my birthday abundance. Perhaps you see a theme. Perhaps.